FuboTV reached 1.3 million paid subscribers globally in Q4, up 106% from the prior-year quarter, said the company’s Wednesday shareholder letter. The virtual MVPD expects the Q1 subscriber count to be 1.028 million-1.033 million subscribers due to seasonality, it said. For the year, it forecast 1.5 million subscribers in North America and revenue of$1.08 billion-$1.09 billion vs. $638 million in 2021. Q4 revenue was $231 million, $230 million without the contribution from French streaming TV platform Molotov, which fuboTV acquired last fall (see 2112080030), it said.
When tackling misinformation, YouTube's three focuses are catching new misinformation before it goes viral, the spread of "borderline" videos that narrowly avoid violating the terms of service that would warrant taking them down, and cultural and language complexities internationally, Chief Product Officer Neal Mohan blogged Thursday. He said use of more-targeted classifiers, keywords in additional languages, and information from regional analysts "will make us faster and more accurate at catching these viral misinfo narratives."
The FCC doesn’t have the authority to require easy access to closed captioning display settings and doesn’t need to, said NCTA, ACA Connects and CTA in comments posted Friday in docket 12-108 in response to the Media Bureau’s call for a refreshed record (see 2201100052). A host of consumer groups disagreed, according to a joint filing from groups including Telecommunications for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, the Helen Keller National Center, the National Association of the Deaf and the American Association of the DeafBlind. The problems highlighted in the FCC’s previous caption display settings round of comments have gotten worse, the groups said. “Apparatus and navigation devices still implement caption display settings through obscure, hard-to-find, hard-to-use, and inconsistent interfaces.” NCTA’s members already “have devoted significant resources to ensuring that the captioning features they provide are straightforward and simple to use,” NCTA said. The consumer tech industry “continues to innovate in user interface design” and “such advances demonstrate that the proposed mandate is unnecessary,” said CTA. The 1990 Television Decoder Circuitry Act “does not authorize the Commission to adopt rules regulating the provision of ‘ready access’ to closed captioning display settings by MVPDs,” said ACA Connects. Enabling viewers to easily access caption display settings is “required by the letter and spirit” of the Television Decoder Circuitry Act “as originally drafted” and consistent with other captioning rules, the consumer groups said. If the agency adopts a display setting requirement, it should include a “reasonable” compliance period and “narrowly tailored exemptions,” said CTA.
The FCC Media Bureau approved the Dish Network and Tegna requests to dismiss their retransmission consent cross-complaints against one another (see 2202090043), per a docket 21-413 order Thursday.
ViacomCBS is now Paramount Global. The name change "represents our rich and storied history in entertainment and embraces our transition into the future," the company announced Tuesday.
More than 78% of global Super Bowl viewing time was on a big-screen TV, reported Conviva Tuesday. Of that subset, Roku-equipped TVs led those of other platforms with 36.3% of viewing time, with Amazon Fire TV second (19.4%) and Samsung TV third (12.8%), it said. Apple TV had 6.6%, Xbox at 4.5%, LG TVs 4.4%, while Vizio TV, Android TV and PlayStation each took about 3% share. Chromecast had 1.3% viewing time, said the report. Mobile phones had 13.9% of viewing time, desktops 5.4% and tablets 2%, it said.
Disney doesn't "subscribe to the belief that theatrical distribution is the only way to build a Disney franchise,” said CEO Bob Chapek on an earnings call Wednesday for fiscal Q1 ended Jan. 1. Disney added 4.1 million paid domestic U.S. Disney+ subscribers in the quarter, said Chief Financial Officer Christine McCarthy, including about 2 million incremental subscribers from including Disney+ and ESPN+ as part of a Hulu Live subscription. Disney continues to see “value in the moviegoing experience,” said Chapek, but Disney’s theatrical business swung to a $98 million operating loss in the quarter, while Disney+ subscriptions jumped 37% to 129.8 million, including 18% growth in domestic U.S. subs to 42.9 million. “The continued growth of our streaming services was certainly a standout,” said the CEO. Chapek estimates Disney+ is “roughly one-third penetrated” in potential U.S. subscribers, he said. Stock closed up 3.4% at $152.16.
The Missouri and Georgia communities backing Reno, Nevada, in its legal fight seeking franchise fees from Netflix and Hulu also are supporting similar litigation brought by Ashdown, Arkansas. In a docket 21-3435 amicus brief Wednesday filed with the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Creve Couer, Missouri, and the various Georgia localities largely echoed their arguments made in the Reno amicus brief filed this week with the 9th Circuit (see 2202080088). They themselves are suing the streaming services, seeking local franchise fees (see 2112230003). Ashdown is appealing a lower court's dismissal of its suit seeking back franchise fees from the streamers.
Dish Network and Tegna asked the FCC to dismiss their fall retransmission consent cross-complaints against one another (see 2111050028) (see here and here) in docket 21-413 Wednesday. Dish said they resolved their retrans dispute and signed an agreement.
The Hart-Scott-Rudino waiting period for Discovery's acquisition of AT&T's spun-off WarnerMedia (see 2105160003) expired Wednesday, Discovery said in an SEC filing that day.